Arrakeen, Arrakis, 10,224 AG, Tuesday Midday (NFB)
Queen Alice of Wonderland
She was the egg. Alice, Queen of Wonderland, guest to House Atreides, tiny Liddell survivor of a fire, she was now a swelling egg, and the egg was cracking. She was cracking. But it wasn't her that was pushing her way out.
It was the usurper, the tiniest Liddell of all, the daughter with Matilda's face. She must be clinging desperately to Alice; otherwise it would not hurt so very much. The harder she pushed, the less anything seemed to happen, except that the egg cracked harder, and more liquid gushed, and Alice became increasingly sure that she would never leave this bed.
That was the secret of the ouroboros. The giant python that ate its own tail and devoured itself. It was never the same snake. The python emerged from its mother's womb and devoured her, only to later birth its own successor.
The phoenix did not rise from its own ashes. Her child did. Each phoenix died. The rise and fall of generations was seen as a movement forward. But not to the phoenix whose ash provided an incubation to its young.
Everyone was staring between her legs. She might have felt awkward about that, in another lifetime, before she began burning herself up. Before she became the phoenix, dying to give birth to her replacement.
"This time, the fire's inside-out," she panted. It was burning from the inside. Her hair was sopping wet, her back, her skin, all of it covered in sweat.
She had lost sense of time. Maybe all of this water was making the burn slow down. Maybe time slowed when the phoenix caught aflame.
Ghanima Atreides
"You are doing fine, Alice," Ghanima soothed, moving at Harah's direction to wipe the sweat away from Alice and cool her down with some chilled, dry towels.
She gestured, and one of the younger girls assisting Harah appeared with cold tea. "Can you drink for me? It may help you relax."
It was also spiked with a liberal dose of Spice, and some other herbs to help her deal with pain. Alice needed to rehydrate and calm down, otherwise this would take longer than necessary, which would not help Leto's nerves.
Leto Atreides II
Leto had enough of memories inside him to know the stages of this, but Ghani had always been closer to their female ancestors than he had. Also, Harah and the other women were in charge, and they were not used to having a father-to-be present, even if they would never question him being there.
He felt helpless. All he could do was watch Alice endure and struggle, and he could do nothing to help. He had promised he would stay, and he would not be anywhere else, but he felt there was no purpose for him here.
Ghanima
More to the point, Harah was giving Leto the evil-eye for daring to insist on staying with Alice, and muttered something uncomplimentary in Fremen about Atreides and her eyes being just as blue as his.
Ghanima barely managed to stifle a giggle. "If you insist on pretending to be a woman and be in our space, brother, put yourself to work," she teased, and some of the other women laughed. "Before we put you in a guimlik or entary and call for a shadout to find you a husband."
Leto
Being laughed at by a group of women in this situation wasn't making things better.
"Alice wanted me to stay," he snapped, then leaned against the bed, placing a hand on Alice's shoulder. He wasn't sure she was noticing.
Alice
Alice took the cup listlessly, forcing herself to sip. Her body was in open revolt, though the python-squeeze had subsided once more. She wasn't certain she could keep anything down. But it took less effort to sip than to explain she did not want to, and if she vomited all of it up, they would not ask her again.
The argument sounded as though it was occurring down a hallway, and Alice couldn't understand the gist of it. Leto wasn't a woman. He was man, or had been. He was part sandworm now. Man-worm? Sand-man?
Not the sandman. The sandman had to throw sand in children's eyes to make them sleep. Wouldn't it blind them? Perhaps he was a sinister figure, in reality. Threatening children into faking sleep, or else he'd blind them with his sand.
The next morning, the Fremen would round up all their blind children and send them out into the desert. Perhaps they could find a Pied Piper to lead them all out, one by one, clutching hands instead of tails.
"He only came for the rats," she said, leaning her head against Leto's arm. "Not all those blind children. One by one by one ..."
Ghanima
"Alice can use your good humor more than your scowl," Ghanima pointed out, raising an eyebrow. The girl's incoherence was worrisome, and Ghanima did not want Leto adding to the fears Alice already had about the baby.
"There are no blind children here, nor any rats," Ghanima said, stroking Alice's hair. "A little muad'Dib, here or there, perhaps," and her lips quirked slightly at her turn-of-phrase, "but the mice tend to prefer the desert to the sietch."
Leto
Leto said nothing, but shot Ghani a look that asked her not to play games with him now. He too was concerned about Alice's seemingly random words. He knew her well enough to know there was a logic to it, but he couldn't see what she was seeing.
"I'm here," he murmured, stroking her hair. "You're not alone."
Alice
Alice wanted out of her skin. Her body was aflame, and the terrible python began squeezing again. Every instinct itched for her to flee. Leave. Conjure a mad hare to race out the window, and let herself follow.
Her body was trapped, but her mind could be free. Disconnected. Already, if she closed her eyes, she could make the voices fade out. She could make everything fade out.
It had been hours? days? and there was no end in sight. Perhaps the phoenix-egg was trapped. Perhaps she wasn't pushing hard enough -- though if that Harah person asked her to push again, she was going to find her vorpal blade and remove the woman's tongue. Perhaps she and the child were inversely linked, one waxed while the other waned, and her strength could only diminish as the process wound itself down.
Was it winding down? It would never wind down. She would never leave. The ouroboros was a stillbirth, and the phoenix's egg a dud. Days would be weeks would be months, and the eggshell would refuse to crack, and the python would squeeze, and here she would sit, an exhibition in pain and futility.
No. She refused.
She grasped onto Leto's fingers and squeezed, not mindful of how hard she might be grabbing. He was her link. Her anchor. She couldn't fly away. Not yet. Not until she'd seen this through.
In which case, if she was giving birth, dying, or both, she'd better get on with it.
"I've a blade," she said, sharply, "for the n-n-next person who thinks I'm not p-pushing."
So there, Harah.
Ghanima
Harah actually laughed, and Ghanima's smile lit up. "There is the Alice we know and love," she said, filling the cup with more honey-tea in case Alice asked for it. "Break his hand if it helps, dear one, as this is part Leto's fault."
Leto
This time Leto just gave Ghani an amused look. Also, his fingers were not easy to break, and even if they had been, he wouldn't have let go. He didn't say anything, just squeezed Alice's hand back.
Alice
Alice squeezed her eyes shut and focused all of herself into that one movement outwards. Whatever the result -- egg, stillbirth, dud, python, life, death -- she was going to push and have this overwith.
There was suddenly a great deal of excitement. Crowning, a few of the help-maids said. Of course. With a mother the sovereign of Wonderland, and a father the Emperor of the Known Universe, the child certainly would have a crown. Though it would have been nice had the crown not been attached at this moment, tearing everything from her belly to her bottom.
Perhaps that was only the little one's head. Perhaps the little one's head had spikes on it, which would make it terribly difficult to fit a crown around. They could call her Spikey. The other children would tease her, but then her father the Emperor and mother the Queen would torture those children and drown them in a lake. There were no lakes here. She, Alice, would personally have a lake built for the purpose. Lake Drowning The Children Who Mock My Own. They could give it a fancier name. Something pretty in Latin. Did Leto know a great deal of Latin? She'd forgotten a great deal of Latin. She'd forgotten so many things. She'd forgotten how to breathe, now, as she was screaming again.
Crowning. Crowning should not be painful; crowning should be kneeling and receiving the weight of the office, and being applauded, and not twisting one's beloved's fingers until one feared they might snap like twigs.
Alice
Time stood still. Months and lifetimes passed, as the eye of the storm centered itself around her. All there was, was pain; was the screaming of her voice, and the pressure, and the confines of this bed.
In a millenia, and in an instant, it was over. Alice slumped back, helpless and weak, gasping for air.
She was no longer screaming. There was a new voice. Tiny, and high.
Her daughter's.
Leto
Harah placed the baby, wrapped in a soft blanket, on Alice's arm. Leto leaned over to look at his daughter for the first time. He reached out a hand and touched her tiny fingers. Her eyes were half-open and all her senses adapting to the new environment.
"She's not Pre-Born."
Had she been she would have met his gaze with the awareness of an adult. He could remember doing that - opening his eyes for the first time. She would not remember. He felt his eyes fill with tears, knowing that would be as incomprehensible to Harah and her helpers as his presence in this room.
Queen Alice
Alice instinctively pulled the bundle close, fighting the other instincts which wanted very much to let her eyes slide closed so she could sleep for at least a solid week.
She was staring at the strangeness of the creature in her arms when Leto's words struck her.
"No," Alice said, swallowing past a forming lump in her throat. "She isn't."
Nor did she seem to have any hideous disfigurements, nor was her skin the color gray, nor was there anything else overtly wrong which Alice had been tormenting herself over.
She couldn't be sure the child wasn't mad, but it was probably hard to diagnose madness when one lacked the ability to do more than stare blearily at the world around one, wet one's self, feed, and nap. So perhaps that, too, have been avoided.
Nor did she have Matilda's face staring at her from the blanket, which was an immense relief, though not without its own, strange sort of ache.
"She's ... herself," Alice said. It was the best possible start she could grant the child. Safe passage into the world.
Ghanima
"As we may all be, someday," Ghanima said, coming over from where she'd been helping with the clean-up. "She is beautiful."
She gave both the parents a soft smile. "We will leave you two alone for a bit. Let us know when you want to schedule the naming ceremony."
Leto
Leto gave Ghani a nod and a small smile in reply, then turned his full attention back to Alice and their newborn child. He could remember so many moments like this - seeing a child for the first time - but this time it was him, in the present, and his own experience.
He laughed softly as the baby blinked with unfocused eyes.
"Herself, yes. And I'm curious to see what her life will be like. Alice?" He looked at her.
Alice
Alice returned his smile, but her eyes were weary. Perhaps it was the exhaustion. Perhaps the newness of her, the child lying here. The surreality of it.
"I feel ... far too many things to feel," Alice said, pressing her lips gently against the girl's forehead. A single tear was sliding down her cheek, though she could not say why. The swirling vortex could not settle on any one feeling to be limited by.
Leto
It was new to them both, but Leto knew it must be more confusing for Alice. She showed affection for the baby though, and he realised he had worried she would be too uneasy to do so. Leto leaned in to kiss first Alice on her cheek and then their child on one of her wrinkled hands.
He hesitated for a moment, then asked: "Can I hold her?" He longed to do so, but didn't want to pull her away from Alice.
Alice
"Of course," Alice said, bundling up her daughter -- their daughter -- in the tiny blanket and carefully, so, so, carefully, handing her to Leto. She hated that some part of her was relieved, to be parting with the burden. She hated that some deep part of her ached, the moment her arms were empty again.
She would be safer in Leto's arms. Alice knew that. Perhaps they both did, deep down.
Leto
The baby made a noise, as if she was uncertain whether being moved when she was perfectly comfortable required screaming or not. As she soon found an equally comfortable place in her father's arms, she forgot about the whole thing and closed her eyes.
Leto just looked at her. Like Alice, he felt unprepared. The baby was tiny, vulnerable, and he was like a desert storm. He could order the death of millions, but what could he do for a small child? Make sure she was safe, yes, but he too needed help.
"I think she has your nose."
Alice
She was tiny. It was so easy to kill enemies; it was so much harder to protect and save, even something this small and precious. Perhaps especially something this small and precious.
"Let us hope that's all she has," she answered softly. "I expected her to have Matilda's face, you know. I knew she wasn't her, but I expected it somehow nonetheless."
(OOC: voila, the newest fandom second-generation kidlet! Her name is still under wraps -- we know it OOC, but they haven't decided IC yet.
Important note: there are not any birth announcements going out just yet, so until or unless your character has been told by someone personally, you can't assume your character might have heard, no matter how close. There's a reason for that, which you'll see in a couple of hours ...
Preplayed with the fabulous future_sandworm and atreideslioness. NFI, NFB-distance, but OOC (and cooing over the bb pics) is love!)